Posts Tagged ‘racism’

I’m married to a BIG black man. Some might say he is larger than life. His ear-to-ear smile brightens every room. His BIG laugh is hilarious and makes others break into chuckles even if they didn’t hear the joke. His BIG shoulders (although very annoying on an airplane) have held many, many heads. And his…

I recently heard an excellent speaker—an older gay man who dedicated his life to advocating for children in the school system—talk about the importance of compassion in these fraught political times. “I grew up with the people who voted for Trump,” he said. “They are not my enemy. If we see each other as enemies…

I watched the inauguration of Barak Obama in 2009 from my living room in Cape Town, South Africa. In my memory it is daytime, and the late afternoon sunshine is coming in through the glass sliding doors. There is a seven-hour time difference between Cape Town and Washington – Cape Town is ahead. My ex-patriot…

This is what I know this morning, Post coffee, Pre wine, There is nothing like waking up to a private message from some guy you’ve never met, never had a one-night stand with, and whose profile picture is a cartoon version of himself. He felt the need to tell me IN ALL CAPS that I…

I have felt many sickening emotions since discovering that Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States: namely, shock, denial, despair, terror, panic, disgust, heartbreak, overwhelm. As Tuesday night unfolded, in addition to the above, I began to feel utterly alone. Awakening to the images of state after state turning red, voting…

I am a biracial, vagina-toting, west-coast, liberal-leaning psychotherapist. I am also Trump. I consumed him on social media. I gave him a decent amount of space in my mind. I grew excited – viscerally – when he shocked me. I cast my vote for him. Stop reading. Take a moment. Breathe. How you feelin’? Here’s…

Oh god it happened. It happened and women like me, white women, made it happen. Within my liberal bubble, I keep using the phrase “I don’t understand.” I don’t understand how more than half of the white women in this country could have cast their vote for someone who makes the world less safe for…

On this, the eve of the most horrifying presidential election in my lifetime, I would like to take this opportunity to admit that I cheated my way through my Civics class in High School. I took those classes by “correspondence.” In that age this meant you received a textbook in the mail, and you mailed…

Two years ago, I saw a posting on a listserv I am a member of requesting a “mid-40’s, transgender female, Taiwanese-American Therapist.” This request was so specific that I had a hard time envisioning how many people could actually respond as an appropriate fit. Requests that are exceedingly demographically specific seem increasingly common to me.…

I learned about the Pulse massacre in Orlando slowly. I admit, the words “shooting in a nightclub in Orlando” didn’t sound, at first pass, like anything other than another depressing tidbit in the news. It took me a few days to understand the depth and horror of the event. As the details trickled into my…

COLOR In the animal world, it indicates danger: the most colorful creatures are often the most poisonous. Color is also a way to attract, and seduce a mate. In the human world color, triggers many more complex, and often deadly reactions. Judith Ortiz Cofer, The Story of My Body Minding the Body Open Invitation…

A “Unicorn.” This is how Gail* describes herself. “I was groomed for this type of work.” Gail’s parents were in tech long before tech was a thing. She describes that her mother and father made sure she was “well-spoken” and highly educated. She now works as a Data Infrastructure Engineer at a hot startup in…

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